Tuesday, July 26, 2011

When There's Nothing On TV

Michael and I watch a lot of TV. We used to not watch as much, but I think since we got our DVR a few years ago it has just been easier to get hooked on more shows....we don't have to watch them when they are on, we can just tape it and watch another time. We very rarely watch a show when it is on anymore. But we do watch so many more shows now. And it is kinda nice to not have to watch commercials.
During the regular season of television shows, our DVR definitely gets a work out. We watch a lot of drama.....Entourage, One Tree Hill, Gossip Girl and 90210 (Michael won't watch those, that is all me), Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice. We watch a lot of comedy.....How I Met Your Mother, The Middle, Modern Family, Parks and Recreation, The Office. We also watch some competition type shows.....Food Network Challenges, Road Rules/Real World Challenges on MTV. And I watch a lot of reality shows that Michael doesn't care about.....any Housewives (usually two cities are on at any given time), Teen Mom/16 and Pregnant, Guiliana and Bill, some shows on TLC (always crap, but they suck me in anyway), and whatever else catches my interest at the time. Plus we watch a handful of shows on the Food Network and HGTV. It's a lot, I know, and I am probably leaving some out.
Lately a lot of these shows have been on a break for the summer, to film new episodes (and to give our DVR a break, haha), and Michael and I have had to find other ways to pass the time instead of sitting in front of the TV catching up a weeks worth of shows. I've have actually really enjoyed doing things other than just watching TV, although we still do a little bit of it, we are definitely not ruled by it at all.
One night, we put Sophia in her exersaucer and blew bubbles at her....at first she just stood still like a stone and squinted her little eyes but then she got into it and was jumping and batting at the bubbles....it was SO cute! Yes, it was a pretty big mess to clean up (thankfully we only had to mop the wood floor half a dozen times to get the soap up, haha) but it was worth the fun.
Another night, we played the Wii for a few hours (not Sophia, she was in her exersaucer watching us). We had a bowling competition and also a canoeing competition that we had to work together on...it was hilarious....my arm was so sore the next day! That probably counts as a little bit of exercise, right?! And Sophia thought it was funny every time Mommy would jump up and down and protest an unfairness or dance around to celebrate a win.
Last night we decided to work together to straighten up the house while Sophia crawled around us and tried to undo our work. Even though I do little chores during the day while Michael is at work (well, laundry is never a little chore but the other stuff sometimes falls by the wayside) I like when we do chores together...it makes me want to do more, clean more, organize more when someone else is working along side me.
Today I was able to tackle a chore that I had been putting off for several months....going through all of Sophia's clothes that she has grown out of and separating the donate and keeps. I have just been boxing everything up as she has grown out of it and it was taking up too much room in her closet. So I set to the task of going through every item and trying to decide what I would keep and what I would donate. Seeing her little tiny clothes made me miss that age...I think I probably kept more of those items than some of the things she just grew out of. I ended up with three big garbage bags full of things to donate, had plenty of boxes to store the keep items in and they fit much more neatly into her closet.
I like when there isn't as much on TV. I feel more productive. I feel like I am spending more quality time with my husband and daughter (even though we are still all together when something is on TV). Michael and I have actually discussed cutting our cable altogether. Or maybe just the DVR. It would save us money and make us weed out the shows we really like to watch together and would free up more of our time to spend doing other, more productive, things. Sure, there will always be some trashy reality show that I could sit down and watch...but I hope that the more time away from the TV that I spend, the less I will miss it and the more I will be able to enjoy other, more fun ways to pass the time!

Thursday, July 21, 2011

What a Chore....Literally

Today I decided to do something that I have yet to do since Sophia was born. Well, maybe I have made some quick runs for one or two things, but so far, I have not done a full grocery shop with just me and Sophia. Usually, Michael will go after work or we will all go together or I will run out myself after Michael gets home from work.
I don't know what I was thinking today. I didn't just have to do a full grocery shop, we needed stuff from Sam's as well. I am sure every mom out there can sympathize with how tough it is to take a baby grocery shopping. I personally dislike grocery shopping altogether (I prefer shopping for clothes, purses, shoes, etc instead!!) and dragging along a baby just makes it more unlikeable of a chore. I did wait until after Sophia had a good morning nap and ate her lunch before I ventured out.
I wanted to go to Sam's first...it is the farthest away from our house and I didn't have any cold items to buy there that I would have to worry about going bad in the extreme heat of my car while I hit up the grocery store. Of course, Sophia fell asleep on the way there. Sophia is old enough to sit in the front of the cart...but....if she is asleep then it is usually best to just keep her in her car seat. So I hefted her car seat into Sam's and put her in the (thankfully) over-sized cart. And of course she woke right up. Oh well. She seemed content as I wheeled around and added a giant box of diapers, wipes, some formula, some hand soap (let's put it this way, we will not need to buy hand soap again for a loooonnnggg time!), and then I had to also buy bottled water. Now I remember why I usually bring or send Michael to do this chore. A package of 32 bottles of water is HEAVY! And that was just kinda dragging it from a low position onto the bottom of the cart....it was ridiculous (I hope no one was watching) loading it from the bottom of the cart to my trunk. Even though by the time I got everything in the trunk and Sophia loaded in the backseat I was sweating like crazy, I felt pretty good about the Sam's portion of my chores. Now on to the grocery store.
I had to put Sophia in the front of the cart for this trip and she seemed pretty happy about it, kicking her feet and pointing at everyone and everything. I did have a list to go by and lots of coupons (um, cause Michael doesn't let us do grocery shopping without a list or coupons) so I started on one side of the store and added things to the cart as I went. I did have to put my diaper bag in the cart so I only had half the space to work with, but I was just making it work at this point. About an hour later, I was finally done collecting the items and was pretty frustrated because I now had to add on a trip to Target to pick up the things that Publix didn't have. Target is right next to our Publix, but still, another trip really wasn't in my plan and by this point I was pretty tired (I spent more time than I cared to searching for stupid grape jelly....apparently Publix moved the pb&j aisle....now it is with the bread, which totally makes sense but annoyed me to no end while I looked for it in practically every other aisle). I loaded my car with all the bags, grabbed Sophia out of the front of the cart and the diaper bag from the back and half ran to Target. A few guys were standing around out front and as I walked by one said something to the effect of 'that baby looks like she's breaking your arm'....or something like that. I just nodded and smiled and hurried past them before they decided to take advantage of my hands-full situation and grab my bag. It was a record Target stop. I didn't even look in the baby clothes section!! As I ran out toward my car (I had gotten a cart inside and Sophia was happily in the front, my diaper bag and purchases in the back), the same guys were there and one said, 'whoa she was quick, is that her?' Kinda creepy that they were apparently keeping tabs on me and timing my shopping trip. I definitely got out of there quick, not that I needed any motivation.
So, all in all, I was gone for about two and a half hours, probably sweated off five pounds, spent an undisclosed amount of money and did the grocery shopping all by myself!! And then when I got home I realized there was no way I could get all that crap, plus my again sleeping baby, into the house. Thankfully Michael was able to come home from work (it was the end of the day, he didn't just leave in the middle or anything), help me unload, then went back to do some more work (since he planned to work late anyway). So not quite an all-by-myself grocery shopping trip! Close enough. :-)

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Good News...I Think

After the drama of the actual sleep study, getting the results were fairly anticlimactic. We were driving up north for our long vacation (a post to follow all about that) and had stopped for lunch at a Cracker Barrel and my phone rang just as we were going in. I saw that it was the pediatricians office calling so I let Michael know I would take the call outside while he went in to put our name in for a table.
I was pretty nervous about what I would hear. The nurse on the phone said that she was calling to let us know the pediatrician had looked over the results of the sleep study and......
Sophia has NO apnea. Ok. I repeated back what she said and she confirmed it. So my brain was kind of swirling and when I should've asked more about the results (why does she snore? what about the skipping breaths if it's not apnea?) I instead said something like, ok, well what do we do now? And she told me that we do nothing, just keep observing her...and then she said something I didn't even realize I was dreading....we'll possibly have to do the sleep study again in 6-12 months if things stay the same. Boo to that. It was bad enough as it was, I can't imagine doing that again when Sophia is older, stronger, and way more aware of things than she was this time around.
When I went in to tell Michael, I couldn't figure out if I was happy or relieved by what the nurse told me. I mean, we really don't know anything more than we did before the sleep study, except for the fact that she doesn't have actual sleep apnea (which technically can be up to 30 pauses in breathing per hour, lasting anywhere from a few seconds to as long as almost a minute....my guess is that Sophia doesn't quite meet those criteria).....it just doesn't really explain why she snores so loudly and does in fact skip some breaths as she sleeps. As we ate, Michael and I discussed what we would like to do next....and we decided that we will have our pediatrician's office fax us the copy of the results (presumably for our records) and then maybe even still go, with those results in hand, to an ENT....just to make sure we can rule out other things (enlarged tonsils or adenoids, for example) as well. I would so much rather be safe than sorry. I trust our pediatrician, but I also don't feel comfortable just sitting back and seeing what happens, so to speak. If every place we take her comes to the same conclusion, that there is nothing to worry about, then I won't worry. And, if worse comes to worse and we have to do the sleep study again, well, we will do it if we really have to.
For now, I choose to take the positive information, no sleep apnea, and be thankful for that. I know that no matter what, things will be ok and Michael and I will do everything we can to keep our little girl healthy and happy and well taken care of. And so while it may not be totally complete news right now, I think I can conclude, at this point, it is definitely good news!